Submission to the Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review of Niger, 52nd Session of the UPR, Human Rights Council – April/May 2026

By | October 13, 2025

UNIVERSAL PERIODIC REVIEW – FOURTH CYCLE
Submission to the 52 nd session of the Human Rights Council’s Universal

Periodic Review Working Group
April-May 2026, Geneva, Switzerland

NIGER

The Center for Family and Human Rights (C-Fam) is a nongovernmental organization that was founded in 1997 and has held Special Consultative Status with the UN Economic and Social Council since 2014. We are headquartered in New York and Washington, D.C., and are a nonprofit, nonpartisan research and advocacy organization that is dedicated to reestablishing a proper understanding of international law, protecting national sovereignty and the dignity of the human person.

INTRODUCTION

  1. In 2020, the ministers and high representatives of 34 countries met to launch the Geneva Consensus Declaration (GCD), in which they committed to promoting four objectives: improve women’s health, protect human life, strengthen the family as the basic unit of society, and defend the sovereignty of nations concerning their laws and policies to protect life.[1]Since Niger is one of the original signatories of the GCD, this report focuses on Niger’s fulfillment of its commitments to human rights in the context of the four pillars of the GCD.

THE GENEVA CONSENSUS DECLARATION

  1. The language of the GCD is drawn exclusively from documents agreed by consensus, including core UN human rights treaties, the founding documents of the UN, such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), and major meeting outcomes such as the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population Development.

PROTECTING MATERNAL HEALTH

  1. At the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), nations pledged “to enable women to go safely through pregnancy and childbirth and provide couples with the best chance of having a healthy infant.”[2] The unique and essential role of women as mothers was recognized in the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action adopted at the 1995 UN Fourth World Conference on Women.[3] Both of these landmark conferences, as well as the subsequent Millennium Development Goals and Sustainable Development Goals, include commitments to reduce maternal and child mortality, and while significant progress has been made around the world, critical gaps remain, especially for those in the poorest, most remote, and resource-deprived areas.
  2. Based on maternal mortality estimates by the World Bank Group, “[t]he maternal mortality rates in Niger have fallen from 1,137 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2000 to 350 deaths in 2023, amounting to a 69.3% reduction in maternal mortality.[4] Despite significant progress and achieving a rate that is below the regional average,[5] continued investment in maternal health is needed to reach the SDG target 3.1 of reducing maternal deaths to 70 per 100,000 births.[6] Data shows that in 2023, the leading causes of maternal death in Niger were “hemorrhage, hypertensive disorders, infections, and obstructed labor,” and that “only 43% of births were attended by skilled birth personnel.”[7] Additionally, according to UNICEF, in 2023, only “33 per cent of mothers aged 20-34 made at least four ANC [antenatal care] visits” during their pregnancies, while for women aged 20 and lower, the figure was 32 per cent.[8]
  3. Research also shows that since 2012 in Niger, “emergency obstetric and neonatal care remained poor” and that “insufficient and unequal distribution of health workforce and infrastructure, high fertility and decade-long insecurity appear to impede longer term progress in maternal and neonatal mortality.”[9]
  4. Long distances and inadequate road infrastructure make it difficult for many pregnant women in the remote areas of Niger to access quality health care. It is notable that the Sahara Desert covers most of of Niger’s large area, and “just 49% of residents have access to a health centre within 5 km of their house.”[10]
  5. Niger can continue to reduce maternal mortality by investing in the infrastructure needed for women’s access to healthcare units, as well as expanding women’s access to skilled birth attendance, and emergency obstetric and antenatal care. Niger can achieve significant improvements in maternal health while also continuing to use its laws to protect the lives of the unborn.

PROTECTING HUMAN LIFE

  1. According to Niger’s Penal Code, abortion is outlawed, with exceptions to save the life or health of the mother, or in cases of foetal impairment. These exceptions require approval by a group of physicians.[11] The law, the absence of significant pro-abortion activity in Niger, and the Nigerien people’s social and cultural opposition to abortion is in line with the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), flagging the importance of mitigating the harmful effects of abortion on women while asserting that “any measures or changes related to abortion within the health system can only be determined at the national or local level according to the national legislative process.”[12]
  2. Abortion is not an international human right, and therefore maintaining legislation that protects unborn life and rejecting any pressure to legalize abortion is consistent with the scope of internationally agreed human rights standards and obligations.

SUPPORT FOR THE FAMILY

  1. The GCD reaffirms the obligations of States regarding the family enshrined in international law, including the definition of the family as “the natural and fundamental group unit of society” and the recognition that it is “entitled to protection by society and the State.” Signatories to the GCD further committed to “support the role of the family as foundational to society and as a source of health, support, and care.”[13]
  2. The Constitution of Niger states that “Marriage and family constitute the natural and moral base of the human community. They are placed under the protection of the State.” It emphasizes the state’s responsibility to ensure “the physical, mental and moral health of the family, particularly of the mother and of the child.”[14]
  3. In Niger, there is no recognition of same-sex marriage. This position of Niger reflects the fact that same-sex marriage is not a subject on which global consensus exists; nor is it included as a right in any binding international legal instrument to which Niger is a party. As summarized in the Family Articles, a project of the coalition Civil Society for the Family, the right to create a family is based on the union of a man and a woman, and “relations between individuals of the same sex and other social and legal arrangements that are neither equivalent nor analogous to the family are not entitled to the protections singularly reserved for the family in international law and policy.”[15]
  4. In its third Universal Periodic Review, Niger received several recommendations to include sexual orientation and gender identity as grounds for non-discrimination, all of which were marked as “noted.”
  5. All human beings possess the same fundamental human rights by their inherent dignity and worth, including the right to equal protection of the law without any discrimination.[16] Individuals who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, etc., are protected from violence and discrimination to the same extent as any individual under the equal protection principle in human rights law. However, they are not entitled to special protections based on their sexual preferences and subjective gender identity as such.

NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY

  1. The legal status of abortion and the protection of the unborn, it is a matter of longstanding consensus that “each nation has the sovereign right to implement programs and activities consistent with their laws and policies.” However, opposition to this sovereign right of countries has become increasingly commonplace in those parts of the United Nations system governed more by expert opinion or bureaucratic oversight than by the standard of negotiated consensus. There is no global mandate to pressure countries to liberalize their abortion laws or expand the categories for non-discrimination as a matter of international human rights law concerning, for example, sexual orientation or gender identity, and to the extent that mandate-holders engage in such behavior, they do so ultra vires.
  2. Nevertheless, the frequency of such pressure has only increased toward countries whose laws restrict abortion to protect the unborn, or which maintain a traditional view of marriage and the family, in line with the human rights obligations expressed in the binding treaties they have ratified. Such nonbinding opinions have been elevated in many parts of the UN, although they have never been accepted nor adopted by consensus in the General Assembly.
  3. Unlike other UN human rights mechanisms, the UPR provides a space for sovereign nations to speak to each other and provide encouragement to fulfill their human rights obligations. To the extent that this venue has been used to exert further pressure on countries to liberalize their abortion laws or redefine the family as a matter of national law and policy, global consensus on these matters must be upheld and promoted in the UPR as well.

CONCLUDING RECOMMENDATIONS

  1. We encourage Niger to continue protecting the natural family and marriage, formed by a husband and a wife, as the fundamental unit of society.
  2. Niger should continue to improve maternal and child health outcomes, including by ensuring adequate and affordable maternal health care, by continuing to invest in infrastructure and expanding women’s access to skilled birth attendance, and emergency obstetric and antenatal care. Niger should continue to expand programs aimed at making primary healthcare more accessible, including by reducing out-of-pocket costs. Following Niger’s commitments to protect life in the womb, this does not require the inclusion of abortion in essential health services.
  3. Niger should continue to assert the fact that abortion is not a human right in the context of multilateral negotiations, as well as in the Universal Periodic Review, following the Geneva Consensus Declaration, and call on its fellow signatories to do likewise.

 

[1] Geneva Consensus Declaration on Promoting Women’s Health and Strengthening the Family, 2020. Available at https://undocs.org/en/A/75/626

[2] United Nations International Conference on Population and Development. (1994). “Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population Development,” Cairo.

[3] United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women. (1995). “Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action” (Annex II, Paragraph 29). Beijing.

[4] The World Bank, Gender Data Portal: Niger. Available at: https://genderdata.worldbank.org/en/economies/niger

[5] World Health Organization, African Region. African region’s maternal and newborn mortality declining, but progress still slow. April 7, 2025. Available at https://www.afro.who.int/news/african-regions-maternal-and-newborn-mortality-declining-progress-still-slow

[6] World Health Organization, Global Health Observatory.  SDG Target 3.1.  Available at https://www.who.int/data/gho/data/themes/topics/sdg-target-3-1-maternal-mortality

[7] World Health Organization, African Region. Niger: improving access to services to reduce maternal mortality April 5, 2025. Available at https://www.afro.who.int/countries/niger/news/niger-improving-access-services-reduce-maternal-mortality

[8] UNICEF.  Maternal and child health disparities in Niger.  January 18, 2025.  Available at https://data.unicef.org/wp-content/uploads/cp/maternal-newborn-health/maternal-and-newborn-health_NER.pdf

[9] Kante AM, Youssoufa LO, Mounkaila A, Mahamadou Y, Bamogo A, Jiwani SS, Hazel E, Maïga A, Munos MK, Walton S, Tam Y, Walker N, Akseer N, Jue Wong H, Moussa M, Dagobi AE, Jessani NS, Amouzou A. Challenges in reducing maternal and neonatal mortality in Niger: an in-depth case study. BMJ Glob Health. 2024 May 6;9(Suppl 2):e011732. doi: 10.1136/bmjgh-2023-011732. PMID: 38770808; PMCID: PMC11085984.Available at https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11085984/

[10] Rabiou, L.M., Oumarou, B., Mor, D. et al. Mobile outreach clinics for improving health care services accessibility in vulnerable populations of the Diffa Region in Niger: a descriptive study. Int J Equity Health 23, 235 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12939-024-02322-0.  Available at https://equityhealthj.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12939-024-02322-0

[11] World Health Organization.  Abortion Policies Database: Niger.  April 22, 2020.  Available at https://abortion-policies.srhr.org/country/niger/

[12] United Nations International Conference on Population and Development, ibid.

[13] Geneva Consensus Declaration, ibid.

[14] Constitution of Niger, 2010 (rev. 2017).  English translation by William S. Hein & Co., Inc.  Available at https://www.constituteproject.org/constitution/Niger_2017

[15] Civil Society for the Family. The Family Articles. Available at https://civilsocietyforthefamily.org/

[16] United Nations. Universal Declaration of Human Rights. 1948. Available at https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights

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